For a moment she didn’t answer. The crowd pushed at them. It was hard to stay in place.

“Al toldja I took yer money. Right?”

“Right.”

She shrugged and said nothing.

“Well, did you? Or was he lying?”

Sylvia shook her head. “No, he ain’t a liar. I took it. While you was sleepin’ in the hotel room.”

Ron didn’t know what to do, what to say. He stood there while the people streamed by, jostling them. The crowd was getting bigger and noisier. His head was hurting. Cars and buses full of people were honking and growling along the street. It was hot and dirty and noisy and confused.

“Why’d you come here?” he blurted.

“T’ warn ya.”

“Warn me?”

“About th’ gate. They won’t letcha through without an ID The hardtops’ll throw ya in th’ Tombs.”

“What’s the Tombs?”

Sylvia glanced across the crowd at the helmeted policeman. “It’s like a big jail. Underground. It’s real old and rotten. They toss ya in there, you never come out again. Nobody ever comes outta th’ Tombs.”

“They can’t do that,” Ron said.

“They sure can,” she insisted, her eyes frightened. “I thought Al gave you back yer ID But Dino’s still got it. Gonna sell it fer fuel, he said. If you got no ID, the hardtops won’t letcha outta th’ Dome. They’ll think yer one of us.”

She was serious. “You really stay here in the City all year long?” Ron asked.

“Yeah. We can’t get out.”

“But . . . how come Al didn’t warn me? Why would he just send me to the gate to be arrested? You told me—”

“Al don’t care. He just wanted t’ get rid of ya.”

“And you do care?”

She frowned. “I . . . I don’t wanna see nobody tossed in th’ Tombs. Nobody. Ya never get out.”

Ron thought a minute. “Then I’ve got to get my ID back from Dino.”

“I can get it off him,” Sylvia said.

“How?”

“I can do it, don’t worry how.”

He grabbed her by the shoulder. “How? The same way you got the money from me?”

Pulling away from his grip, Sylvia answered, “Yeah. Sort of.”

Ron shook his head. “No. I’ll get it back from Dino. I’ll break him in half, if I have to. Come on.”

He started pushing through the crowd back the way they had both come. Sylvia had to trot a few steps to catch up with him.

“You can’t fight Dino . . . not like you are.”

Ron said, “I can break every bone in his body with one hand.”

“No . . . you can’t . . .”

But Ron wouldn’t listen. He kept walking. She stayed beside him, silent.

They walked up the street, away from the gate and the hectic crowd. They passed a hotel on the other side of the street. Men and women were leaning out of its windows, laughing and throwing things down onto the sidewalk. Somebody tossed a stuffed chair through a window, about ten flights up. It crashed through the glass and spun as it fell in a shower of glass shards. People on the sidewalk jumped and screamed as they raced out of the way. The chair hit the pavement like an explosion.